God's Gifts
by Laughing Still
Summary: Once she left that high school after graduation, Sakura never expected to see him again. God, however, had different plans. AU. SasuSaku.


_God's Gifts_

_By _

_Laughing Still_

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto, wish I did but I don't.

"Alright, that a wrap. Stitch him up and get him out of here."

"I'll do it, Haruno. You go call it a night."

"Thanks, Ino. I'll take you up on that."

The doctor moved aside and turned left, exiting the OR for the first time in 16 hours. She peeled off the sweaty facial mask and muttered a prayer of thanksgiving as the gloves followed.

"Oh that feels good." She groaned as she washed her hands and splashed the wonderfully frigid water on her face. She straightened and reached for a paper towel.

_Knock. Knock._

She looked at the entrance of the makeshift washroom and saw a nurse poking her head in.

"Excuse me Colonel Haruno. There's a man here who's recovering from surgery in the ICU and I was wondering if you could take a look at him. Dr. Kendall said that he should be ready to go tonight but he's gone and—well, I know it's too late to discharge him tonight but I just want to let the staff know…" She drifted off, clearly embarrassed.

Sakura took pity on her. "Certainly, Murphy. Just show me where he is."

The nurse nodded and Sakura followed her the 20 yards to the ICU. It was only dimly lit and for the first time since she could remember, peaceful.

"2nd bed from the back. Right wall." Murphy whispered. "I'll go get his records."

Sakura nodded and walked in, going slowly to avoid breaking the precious silence. One of the men shifted in his sleep and she made a mental note to tell Murphy to up his morphine. Carson shouldn't have to suffer, especially with that damaged lung…

She was there. This bed, like so many of those beside it, was quiet and it's occupant still. She picked up the chart clipped to the edge of the bed and looked at it, idly thinking that Murphy was on a wild goose chase.

**Branch: US Navy  
Rank: Admiral (O-10)  
Name:**

Her eyebrows went up even as her heart stopped.

**Sasuke Uchiha**

She looked at the patient and moved slightly closer, stopping just short of the foot board. Now she saw the name, she really looked at him, taking in all the tiny changes and comparing them to the long stored memories now flooding back.

The war, not kind to anybody, had taken its toll on him. There were scars on his face she had no memory of and the large bandages on his torso told her nothing pleasant. His right leg was in a cast and she noticed, with another missed heartbeat, that that was an acid burn on his left shoulder. Setting aside the injuries, he was almost exactly as she remembered. He was a little taller than when she had last seen him and certainly much buffer, but other than that, he was the same as he had been on graduation day.

Good gosh, that seemed another lifetime ago and at the same time, she could see everything, particularly _him_. She had only been at that high school a year, transferring in her senior year but it was the year she remembered most. She'd gone from the new kid on the block to the girl who had a few friends. She'd never been the darling of the school but somehow, everyone knew her name and "everyone was talking about Sakura".

_He_ had been in her first period Trig class and within half a semester, she'd tripped heels over head for him and with it came the whole 9 yards.

Not that it ever came to anything. The year had come and gone and they'd exchanged maybe a dozen comments, and that was at best. Even today, the man sleeping across from her had no idea how she had felt about him.

She opened her mouth, that old, insane urge to confess to him reappearing while another side said that now she was over him, it wouldn't hurt.

But what was she going to say?

_I like you, Sasuke. Actually, it'd be _liked_, back in high school. Remember me? We were in Trig together and you sat back and right of me. You probably don't know what I'm talking about. I highly doubt I even registered on your radar. But you did mine, and you have no idea how much. I used to watch you all the time before class, subtly of course, but watching. I memorized your schedule and you could probably have me arrested for visual stalking. You had Trig first, then Band, then you did something in the gym and somewhere in there you had Theology. I know you took physics because you used to complain about it all the time. Every time I walked down a hallway or entered the lunch room, I would look for you and I swear by the end of the year, I could find you instinctively. I fantasized about you asking me to Prom and texting me. I thought your wardrobe consisted of about 7 shirts and 4 pair of shorts and those deplorable neon shoes. Seriously, what the hell was up with that? I knew exactly which car was yours and roughly where your locker was. The car was a Toyota Camry (like mine!) in sand brown with a black front bumper and the license plate was 857-OOH and the protector thing said "NUGGETS". I nearly ran over some girl one time when school got out because you pulled out right behind me—then I nearly wrecked. I was ready to kill the two girls who came up and sat on either side of you one lunch, only to realize it was Jake Brenton. The two times you opened the door for me completely made my day and I swear I'd just gone to Cloud 9. I wrote you the first poem I'd ever written, confessing _and_ a letter doing the same thing. Heck, I wrote you two letters and seriously considered mailing them. Then during finals and the yearbook signing, I debated for half an hour whether to sign your book and confess right there, doing a sort of "I –love-you-I'm-leaving" thing. _Then_ when I didn't do that, I went to the library and wrote myself a letter saying I didn't mind _not _signing your year book and _then_ I went home and nearly cried because I _hadn't _ told you!_

She may kill herself.

But even as she looked at her former crush, the urge faded and her mouth closed, her eyes taking everything again.

The burn, the broken shin, and the bandaged chest (tank shrapnel, she now knew from a glance at the chart) were all noted but it was the face she lingered on. The scars, (one on the right temple and another on the lower left jaw) she could only guess what they were from. Most likely more shrapnel or a savage knife. But they had healed cleanly and she was only thankful that that was all the damage done to that face she had liked so well. What gave her the greatest relief though, was his expression. It was utterly peaceful, thank God, and she knew that the scars she could see, were the only scars.

She stepped back and picked up the chart, sensing Murphy in the hallway.

"I couldn't find it anywhere Dr. Harun—oh there it is! So you've had it all this time! I'm so sorry for the wait! So, how's he looking?"

Sakura flipped the page and looked at the scrawled notes of one of her fellow M.D.s.

"Everything's in order." She turned the second page and scribbled a signature on the appropriate line "Discharged. You can send him out first thing in the morning."

"Oh _thank you_ Dr. Haruno! You don't know what this does for me! Well, good night!"

"Goodnight." The doctor nodded to her and left the room, heading back to her own quarters.

Many, many years later, a certain raven haired retired Naval Admiral sat in his doctor's office watching the man read through his history.

"Sasuke, you were in the armed forces, correct?"

"Yes."

"What branch?"

"Navy."

Silverton flipped a page.

"What did you do?"

"I was a S.E.A.L."

Another page. "Yes, is says that here. Were you ever deployed?"

"Yes, several times."

"Even during the war?"

A third page.

"Yes."

"Iraq?"

"Afghanistan."

"Ahh, were you injured over there?"

"Yes." Sasuke replied, wondering where this was going. "I was hospitalized once during my time there."

_Flip._ ""For an injury?"

"Yes, I took tank shrapnel to the chest and had a few other injuries."

"Yes, I found it. According to this it was "Broken Tibia, damaged kidney" and then of course, your shrapnel injuries." He flipped another paged and looked over it.

"What?" Sasuke asked, seeing Silverton's suddenly creased eyebrows and puzzled frown.

"Hang on." He went to a previous page, then back again. "Do you remember the doctor who operated on you?"

"Um, there was only one. A doctor Fine? Flight? Something like that."

"Doctor Zachary Flynn?"

"Yes, him."

"Yes, there's his signature for the operation but…you said there was only _one_ doctor you saw."

"Yes. He was an Air Force Major and right around my age."

"Does the name "Dr. Sakura Haruno" ring a bell?"

It was his turn to frown. "No. Should it?"

"Well, she—I'm presuming it's a she—was the doctor who signed your discharge papers. Didn't you see her?"

"No, never. I never saw anyone but Flynn. One day I just woke up and they said that everything was in order and I could go. Why?"

The doctor didn't answer but turned another page, then flipped back again. "No, that doesn't look like her handwriting…" He muttered.

'Doctor, what is—"

"Did you have any visitors, Sasuke? Anyone at any time? Clergy, maybe?"

He was completely lost now.

"No." He said slowly, digging up old memories. "I was in only a few days and saw the hospital staff."

The doctor didn't seem to be listening. "Well, _maybe_ one of the nurses. Sasuke, do you have any reason to think that one of the nurses might have liked you?"

He was stunned, not to mention slightly irritated.

"Silverton, what in the world are you trying to get at?"

The doctor stood up and handed him the folder. "I'm trying to find why in the hell that would be in here." He pointed.

Sasuke looked down. It was his discharge form releasing him from the hospital. It looked fine. There was the statement and underneath it and the signature of the doctor he had never met.

"Silverton, what—"

He spotted it. There, scrawled in the lower left hand corner in a completely different hand than any on that page and utterly foreign was:

_God's gifts are very strange._


End file.
